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Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Review: Call of Duty Black Ops Prestige Edition RC-XD

Call of Duty:Black Ops Prestige Edition RC-XD. Coooool!

Ok where are my priorities?! Call of Duty: Black Ops is one of the most anticipated video games of 2010 and expected to top the king of first person shooters, it's predecessor Modern Warfare 2. One of the ways to pre-order the game was the special "Prestige Edition", which along with various other things, comes with a radio controlled vehicle, modeled after an explosive device in the game. Although it doesn't explode, it DOES come with an on board video surveillance camera in its nose which transmits back to the controller.

I'm not much of a first person shooter fan to be honest-in fact I royally suck at them, but I've had an interest in these games, mainly because there has always been a link between those who see COD as an inspiration for their love of Nerf. This time around though, my purchase of Black Ops has almost nothing to do with the game; my priorities are with the RC car...and that's what I'll be writing about in this post:)

Call of Duty: Black Ops Prestige Edition Packaging

There were various editions one could preorder for Call of Duty: Black Ops, but only the Prestige Edition came with the RC-XD toy. I ordered mine from fishpond.com.au and it arrived a day after the official launch of Black Ops, which was pretty good of them. The packaging was very well done, with a clear window showing the RC car that was secured into the box in a way that rivaled old school Nerf blaster packaging! The inside of the packaging has the game in a very cool box, a black ops "medal" to..err. hang up somewhere, the RC unit, transmitter and a plastic display stand.

The Black Ops "RC-XD Video Surveillance Vehicle"

The RC unit and controller take 6 AA batteries each. The transmitter has a battery indicator on the screen to let you know if your batteries are crap, so I had to go out and buy fresh ones:)

Black Ops RC-XD front: smile for the camera!

The RC car unit is bigger and more sturdy than I thought it would be, and with batteries quite weighty. It's a higher build quality than I was expecting; right down to "realistic" details like scratches and dents.

Side view of the RC-XD

It's not made to look pretty or resemble a car of sorts, more of a wad of C4 with wires sticking out of it:) What makes it fun but gimmicky is the camera in its nose- it's not a GREAT quality camera, but basic VGA does the job for what is essentially a toy:) It's got an in built mic too for listening "surveillance" but the car itself is pretty noisy to drive so I doubt you'd be able to sneak it in anywhere covertly:P

RC-XD up close

I actually was expecting the unit to be about palm sized, but it's easily 20cm long and quite thick. It's even got spring suspension and air filled squishy tyres. Bonus!

Suspension and squishy tyres! It's quality mate, quality:P

The RC transmitter is a pistol grip style controller and has a small LCD monitor on the front, a speaker and a whole bunch of buttons on top; one is to change the volume of the speaker, one is to change the speed of your unit (faster for "infiltration" and slower for video surveillance) and a small wheel for assigning the trim on your car. A fair whack of functionality for what I was expecting to be a dodgy giveaway:)

Various buttons on the transmitter to do..things:P

The directional wheel is a big silver disc on the side- it feels a little flimsy but it does the job ok.

A pistol grip style controller.

So how does it perform? It's a LOT faster than I was expecting and has a decent turning circle- it zips in and out pretty well throughout my apartment and so long as there's fresh batteries, I haven't had any instances where it's been out of range for me. The camera isn't fantastic so in low light you see pretty much nothing and even in great lighting conditions it still looks like.. old school first generation colour screens on mobile phones back in 2004:P Again, ultimately it's no high performance RC racer.. it's a kid's toy.. but a fun one nonetheless:)

Through the "eyes" of the RC-XD on the lil' monitor. HD it ain't

As a gift-with-purchase, the RC-XD unit is a lot of fun. The Black Ops marketing guys have definitely chosen a very cool toy to package the game with, and while I'm not sure it's necessarily worth the extra 80 bucks on top of the game that I paid, I don't at all feel like it was a waste of my money. It shoots and bounces around the apartment like noone's business, and if you had a foot fetish, this would be a winner.. if the camera was better quality.(All you modders out there, it'd be cool if you could work out how to wire the camera (or the monitor) up to record onto an SD card or something!)

Size comparison to the other thing available today- the Barricade RV-10

As for the game.. I haven't had a chance to try it yet.. and I haven't done a game review on Urban Taggers, but maybe Call of Duty: Black Ops deserves one. See how we go in a few days time..once I've finished playing with the RC-XD:)

The RRP of the Prestige Edition was $229.00 AUS but I picked it up with a whole bunch of promos and deals for $169.00. I'm not sure I could recommend it to anyone.but I will because it's fun and I love it:)

13 comments:

Pocket, it sounds like you have a small itch for some FPV r/c fun that needs to be scratched. =) I fly R/C planes as one of my more-involved hobbies, and First Person Video flying is what I'm REALLY itching to get into. If you think this little car is fun, you should check out some of this stuff: http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=972676

Here's a video from one of my favorite FPV pilots who likes to record what he sees and share it. Really makes me want to get into it! http://www.vimeo.com/16604842

He actually has two cameras - one for his pilot view, and then one to do the HD recording (a GoPro HD). I'm not sure what brand the one he's using for his actual in-flight view is, but you can see it here: http://vimeo.com/6601583. There are a variety of cams that size with varying specs that the FPV guys use. A lot of them will have the camera mounted to a pan and tilt block where they can move it around in flight, and some guys will even wear a hat with a gyro attached to it that transmits back to the pan-tilt module, so as they move their head around on the ground, the camera moves around in-flight as if they were looking out a virtual window. It's pretty awesome, but a lot easier to get disoriented with that kind of set up. Just a simple "pan left and right with the rudder control" is a lot easier to manage to start with.

The guy who posted that video has a ton more on his RCGroups blog. Check 'em out if you're looking for a way to kill 30 minutes with some cool flight videos: http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/member.php?u=140585

And last but not least, what's really crazy is all the OnScreen Display stuff you can add to your video feed. Not online highly informative when you're flying, but also makes you feel a little bit more like you're in some sort of fighter jet. =D http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qL0dVHmx0qY

Hi. I find that hooking up an rc camera with feed onto a 3 axis rc helicopter does a great job! There are usually ones about the size of a cut in half shoe box and its so fun tho cut the bottom out and put a camera in it. U can see what theyre doin from the air. Or dont even fly it and use the audio to your advantage. The cameras angled so u can see ahead of yourself of course. The veiwing thingy is sticking out of the bottom so slightly that when its not flying it looks like its a regurlar heli and when flying you can see infront of you on the way top and below on the way bottom.

Where can i get one?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? and how much does it realy cost $$$$$$?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????!!!!!!!!!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! XD

A toy blaster resource; from a kidult's perspective living in an Australian inner city apartment. Focusing on out- of- the- box foam dart, laser tag and water guns with the odd two player co-op game thrown in for good measure:)